Waiting
by travelswith
Summary: Dealing is the hardest part. Hogan waits, Pepper deflects and Tony is Tony. Everyone is over indulgent.


Hogan spends his days waiting. In a car that costs more than he'll ever know, in a suit too sharp and too stylishly black. He only goes through a pack of cigarettes a day. A good day.

He listens to the radio, tries to follow politics, the news. He listens to self-hating Jewish comedians on tape because, even though he's not self-hating, it still feels good to laugh at himself. He reads books on war and history. He has very fascinating conversations with strange women who want to know if he'll introduce them to his billionaire, superhero boss.

Sometimes he'll play old, bluesy rock'n roll, sit back, smoke a joint and watch the clouds.

Sometimes Pepper will join him. They'll get high and laugh at Tony's antics and feel elite because they're in the Tony Club. Which gets them laughing again. And when Tony's done, Pepper applies eye-drops, Hogan changes the music from Dylan to Black Sabbath and the fun is over.

That is, until Tony's two o'clock with the Minister of Defense.

-

It wasn't always like this. Just the last couple of weeks, when the knots in Pepper's back became a problem. Hogan convinced her that the practical thing to do was to chill the fuck out and let Tony ride his own learning curve.

Obviously, part of Tony's learning curve involves drinking a lot. And then failing a mission in Iran and having to abort, which results in a mess of Middle Eastern politics and a too many casualties. And then falling in love with an Egyptian model, who ends up being a spy for a multi-national terrorist organization. After her arrest, the learning curve starts to spiral a bit.

Pepper wants to help him. Or wants to want to help him. But there's not a lot she can do. She's scared of saying the wrong thing, scared of his cold shoulder, scared of being shut out or shut down.

So she spends more time with Hogan, getting high in the back of the Rolls Royce, trying to laugh off the stress and the constant ball of nervous energy that is, in essence, _Tony_.

-

She's pretty sure he knows.

After an opening night at a museum, a reporter asks, "How did you find the exhibition?"

"GPS," Tony whips out and Pepper laughs a little too hard.

-

She wears sunglasses and starts having trouble navigating simple things like stairs.

When he shows her some designs for Mark IV that JARVIS has rendered on screen, she leans in close to the monitor and says, "That is _amazing_. But, hey, why don't you make it blue? And then you'll be able to like, _camouflage_ against the sky…"

Tony mutters, "You're not usually this enthusiastic."

But he gives her a rundown of some of the new features he's working on, which she finds completely fascinating until she realizes how hungry she is and gets distracted by Tony's moustache.

-

Iran the Sequel happens. This time Iron Man is victorious.

When he gets home Pepper does her best to fix him, but it's bad.

"You need professional help," she tells Tony dryly and dials the number of a surgeon they have on payroll. His name is Brian, and he knocks Tony out with a heavy anesthetic before getting to work on the flesh wounds.

"Oh, _god_," says Pepper, rolling her eyes as she climbs the stairs up the living room. Happy is flicking through the TV channels.

"How's he doing?"

"Fine. He's been through worse."

He shoots her a sideways glance, and says, "What's wrong?"

"Fuck, I think I've become jaded." She gives a harsh, nervous laugh, and looks out at the ocean.

"Took you long enough to resent your boss. At least the pining stage is over and done with."

She smiles at him. "I don't know if I resent him. I think I just… Do _you_ resent him?"

Happy considers this for a moment. "Sometimes. It always passes, though."

-

After a few weeks, they stop talking about him.

Tony recovers, does a stint in Israel. Hogan tells him to drop in at his mum's, in Netanya.

Tony brings back a glass pomegranate for Pepper. She doesn't take it home- but places it on her desk at Stark Industries.

-

Happy always has good weed, but the hash plays with her hormones.

Before Tony and Pepper board the jet, Hogan presses a small package into her hands. It's wrapped in foil. Pepper doesn't unwrap it until they've taken off and Tony has drunkenly retired with a leggy brunette air-hostess.

"_She_ doesn't mind," Pepper hears him mumble into the girl's ear as they stumble into the private compartment of the jet. "Potts is one of the guys."

The brunette giggles and Pepper stares determinedly out the window at the setting sun casting golden rays over the clouds.

She unwraps the foil, and is pleased to find a single, chocolate chipped muffin that end up getting her really, _really_ fucked up.

-

"You look like you're having a good time," Tony says, climbing into the seat next to her. Pepper grins, because that's all her face seems capable of doing, and she reaches out for his hand. The warmth of his skin is delicious and grounding and-

"You take one too many valiums? It's a short trip- two would've sufficed."

"Tony," Pepper says, because the weight of the confession is physically hurting her. "I have to tell you something."

Tony pulls his hand back so he can finish buttoning his shirt. "Yah?"

"Hogan and I have been hot-boxing the Royce. For months."

Tony doesn't look surprised, but Pepper feels better for saying it.

"There are few things I can't deal with. A stoney PA is not one of them," he says as his hands grappled his tie. "We'll be in Paris in half an hour- think you can make it to the hotel?"

-

Paris is a dream of bright lights and swirling fabrics and too-thin models and garbled French accents. Tony leaves her in the hotel for most of it, disappearing with exquisitely featured women. Women with hair like black velvet and dark eyes that sparkle. Women who wear blood red lipstick and laugh just so.

She watches Tony fall in love a million times, and the morning they're set to fly back to the States Pepper struggles with the internet connection. She breathes deep, in and out. She slams the laptop shut and cries.

Tony finds her an hour later, sitting on the floor of the hotel suit.

'Stop,' he says. 'Please stop.'

'I can't,' she gulps through sobs.

'Hash will do that,' Tony tells her, awkwardly placing his large and calloused hand on the small of her back. He gives her a tissue, forces water down her throat and waits for her to stop crying. He never asks why she started in the first place.

If he had, she wouldn't have been able to answer.

-

He brings one of them home. In midair, the girl lights dainty cigarettes and smokes them like a silver-screen goddess, gloved fingers running through Tony's hair while Pepper tries to look away.

Tony never lets anyone smoke on his planes.

-

The girl leaves Tony after three days.

'He's a little,' she says, as Pepper walks her to the car, 'Hmm… socially retarded.'

Hogan throws her luggage into the boot and glances meaningfully at Pepper, as if to say, 'We all are.'

-

She finds Tony on the roof, swigging wine from the bottle, his shirt undone so she can see the tip of the arc-reactor.

'How'd she take it?'

'How are you taking it?' she asks, leaning against the wall. He glares out at ocean, his face a stone wall.

'Like a champ.'

-

'Potts.'

'Tony, I'm busy.'

'Potts.'

She puts down the phone, closes the laptop, crosses her legs, purses her lips. She says, 'Shoot.'

Tony looks around, then looks her in the eye. His fists are clenched. 'You're my team. Your job is to look after me, your work is to make sure I work. Your job is to make sure I'm not alone in Paris, that I don't fall in love with whores, that I don't bring them _home_ and that they don't...'

Later, as Pepper picks out the shards of pomegranate glass from Tony's skin, she wonders if she should apologies. She wants to, but she won't. They're both too proud for that.

Tony grimaces and says, 'I really should fire you.'

'That would take the edge off it,' Pepper murmurs.

-

Hogan listens to Nina Simon, and takes bong hits behind the tainted windows. He goes through a pack or so of cigarettes a day. He plays Jackie Mason tapes and laughs at himself and at the world. He taps the wheel. He imagines being a superhero.

He waits for Tony and Pepper.


End file.
